Digital trust II: A consumer perspective

The internet is fundamental to daily life. People go online for a multitude of reasons, be that to catch up on latest news events, for learning, or to post a comment on a social media outlet, among many others. Many consumers and businesses also use the internet for commercial transactions, a trend accelerated by the lockdown days of the COVID-19 pandemic.

This hive of activity indicates that there is already a great deal of trust from many quarters in using the internet. However, this is not a universal truth. Going online entails leaving a personal digital data footprint, and surveys suggest that there is also reticence on the part of consumers, about how much data they might want to share.

Willingness to share information can be driven by factors particular to an individual, such as speed of thought or psychological type. They could also be influenced by environmental factors common to the different age cohorts, cultures, groups or nations (See Figure 1). Speed of online decision making and data sharing also depend on amount of information available digitally, alongside factors such as user experience design.

Figure 1

The correlation between digital infrastructure and digital trust is not always strong. Hence it is not necessarily true that consumers in advanced markets are more digital than in emerging economies. This study investigates the drivers behind this and many other facets of engagement with the digital economy. It builds on our previous publication Decoding digital trust published last year, which focused on identifying where digital trust might be established. Decoding digital trust II considers the consumer perspective, with reference to the experience of the digital and physical realms becoming increasingly intertwined.

Read the full report below to find out more.